Reactive Materials for Enhanced Munitions

Munitions systems are becoming increasingly complex to address the challenges of the modern battlefield.  This includes the addition of a suite of sensors, actuators, and guidance systems to enable long-range, precision fire.  Man-portable unmanned aerial systems (UAS) and missile systems provide the warfighter with on-demand air support, but do so under significant size weight and power - cost (SWaP-C) constraints.  In both scenarios, the available warhead mass and volume is limited.  Desires to improved warhead performance are therefore reliant on improved explosive energy.  Unfortunately, modern high-explosives have reached a point of only incremental improvements in blast energy.  Solutions are needed which can enhance blast energy with minimal increase to an asset’s SWaP-C. To maintain an asymmetric advantage in our military capabilities, better methods must be developed to improve the explosive yield of munitions through the use of reactive materials (RM) as a casing replacement or liner. RMs supply additional energy to blast and enhance blaster performance.  For low SWaP-C applications, there is a desire to replace liners and casings with RMs to provide a drop-in solution which enhanced blast performance and does not result in requalification of the explosive. In the proposed work, HAMR Industries LLC, in collaboration with the Applied Research Laboratory at Penn State University (ARL-PSU) will demonstrate the improved blast potential of reactive munition casings produced via a novel additive manufacturing process.  A Ni-Al intermetallic powder system will be used as the casing material in the Phase I feasibility study, and its blast potential will be evaluated with multiple HE material to understand if synergistic relationships occur.  HF-1 steel will serve as a baseline to benchmark the blast performance improvements and structural integrity. In addition, new material systems will be developed and tested using lab-scale ignition and propagation studies to demonstrate the potential for more powerful RMs which can act as structural, load bearing components.  Combining these new materials with the process-structure-property relationships and HE-RM relationships derived in Phase I will enable the team to begin optimization of blast performance in Phase II, and initiate platform specific prototype demonstrations.